The big question: Raise it, leave it alone or eliminate it?

Employees at places like fast-food restaurants and other retail establishments typically earn minimum wage, which is not enough to make ends meet without substantial financial assistance from other sources.

If there is anything obvious about a minimum wage boost, it's that nobody can definitively predict what its effects will be. It might stimulate the economy by putting more money in the hands of working-class Americans; on the other hand, it may result in the loss of jobs and do more harm than good to the very low-income people it was intended to help. There isn't even agreement on whether it is effectively higher today than it was in the past, because as the minimum wage rises, the rest of the economy also changes.

Looking simply at dollars then and now, without adjusting for inflation - what each dollar will purchase - it is plain that minimum wage has done nothing but climb. But the purchasing power of today's minimum wage is actually lower.

Typically, those who advocate for workers say it is good for the economy to put more dollars in the hands of lower-income workers because they will spend it immediately and boost the economy.

On the other hand, business representatives tend to say the opposite, that raising minimum wage will destroy jobs or increase prices because businesses cannot afford to pick up the extra cost.

There is some truth on both sides of that equation. And because it is not an exact science, nailing down the tipping point at which the benefits outweigh the costs, or the costs nullify the benefits, is not easy.

Henry Ford, founder of the automobile company that bears his name, is famous for unexpectedly increasing his workers' wages to more than double the going rate so his workers could afford the products they were building. But there's one problem: According to the company's website, that's not the reason Ford increased wages and cut workers' shifts from nine hours to eight. The real reason makes even more sense, from a business perspective:

In 1914, Ford startled the world by more than doubling the wages of many of his employees from $2.25 per day to $5 per day. He did this not so they could afford to purchase his cars, but because he wanted to reduce employee turnover, which is costly. His effort accomplished that goal. He also reduced the workday from nine hours to eight. This, again, was not out of compassion for his workers, but so he could run his assembly line for three full shifts per day, each of them eight hours, increasing overall productivity.

Henry Ford's unprecedented $5-per-day wage was a win-win, lowering his overall costs while also benefiting those who earned it.

Today, a popular tactic is to lower business costs by squeezing more work out of fewer employees - by definition, increasing productivity. Productivity is high, but unemployment also remains high. Alarmingly, employees are often seen as liabilities rather than valued assets.

There was a time when U.S. companies bragged about employee loyalty. Not today. Layoffs are commonplace, even though we are supposed to be recovering from a major recession.

The negative economic impact of unemployed and underemployed workers who have little or no discretionary income is largely ignored in public discourse; if acknowledged at all, it is to disparage these job seekers for not trying hard enough and for being lazy or overly fond of government largess.

If today's businesses could be relied upon to seek out mutually beneficial strategies that focus on retention of good employees and considering long-term benefits as well as the next quarterly earnings report, we wouldn't need a minimum wage law.

Then again, from where minimum-wage workers stand, it's downright disheartening to work long hours at a repetitive, meaningless job and still be living in abject poverty, unable to subsist without government assistance.

Not all of today's minimum-wage workers are teenagers or unskilled adults. They are also college graduates who cannot find work in the fields they studied and retirees who cannot make it on retirement funds that were diminished by stock-market fluctuations and other unforeseen circumstances.

It's not the job of an employer, of course, to subsidize anyone's lifestyle, and there are examples and studies that will confirm just about any point of view on either side of the debate, which makes it all the more difficult to figure out the best strategy.

There should be a balanced point at which workers can work and support themselves without destroying their employers' profitability; finding it and then maintaining it is the tricky part. Too much giving or taking in either direction upsets the applecart.

Labor Day, which is Monday, provides an opportunity for everyone to contemplate the value and status of working-class Americans, a demographic to which most of us have belonged at some point.